Moderna has been awarded approximately $590 million from the federal government to help speed up the development of an mRNA-based bird flu vaccine, health officials said.

The US Department of Health and Human Services will award $590 million to Moderna to continue developing a vaccine to protect against bird flu, the pharmaceutical company announced Friday.

The risk to the general public from bird flu is low, and there has been no further evidence of person to person spread, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.